This is a reply to Elisabeth Camp's and Elijah Millgram's probing discussions of "Games and the Art of Agency", in a symposium in Journal of Ethics and Social Philosophy. Millgram argues that games cannot function as a guide to life, because they are too different from life. Games are limited in a special way: in life, we deliberate about what goals we want to take on, but in games, the goals are fixed and given to us. Camp argues that there (...) is nothing particularly special about games, because the fluidity of agency is all over ordinary life too - games are just like ordinary life. I respond to Millgram: we do deliberate about our ends, in games, when we aesthetically reflect on which games to play. And I respond to Camp: games are distinctive in the way they regulate how our reasons flow across the game/life border. To respond to these criticisms, I add some substantial new features to my account of the motivational structure of game-play. (shrink)

This paper presents the metaphysics of the Vietnamese Buddhist Zen monk Thich Nhat Hanh. He interprets the Buddhist principle of interdependent arising in terms of interbeing, the idea that everything depends for its existence on everything else. On his view, everything “inter-is” with everything else, or “to be is to inter-be.” His interpretation is particularly interesting in light of the contemporary debate on fundamentality in western metaphysics. By embracing the idea of interbeing, he opposes the view that there are fundamental (...) entities which do not depend for their existence on anything else. I give an outline of Thich Nhat Hanh’s views, answer an objection, and explain his reasons for adopting his standpoint. My aim is not to offer a full defense of his views, but only to show that the often neglected position of metaphysical coherentism, which Thich Nhat Hanh adopts, deserves further consideration. (shrink)

O estado, em sentido amplo, pode ser entendido como um conjunto de teorias, cujo núcleo e relações tem despertado, desde muito tempo, o interesse em desvendar por muitos filósofos. O interesse sobre o estado configura a base para os estudos científicos, com o objetivo de prever a evolução, formas e modelos de estado futuros. Nesse sentido, teorizar sobre as formas de estado constitui uma forma concreta que nos ajuda entender a constituição de estados modernos, como, no caso, o estado do (...) Vietnã. Esta pesquisa se perfaz do método da dialética materialista, através da análise e de sínteses para entendermos algumas ideias políticas de Platão. A pesquisa aborda em que medida as ideias platônicas podem contribuir para o entendimento do atual estado de desenvolvimento do Vietnã, na medida em que ele se propõe ser um estado para o povo e pelo povo. Nesse contexto, destacamos a influência das ideias de Platão na para a formação de um estado que prioriza a excelência conjunta e a governança ética, na medida em que se caracteriza pela atemporalidade e pela universalidade de suas ideias. A pesquisa revela, ainda, que a filosofia política de Platão oferece pontos de vista valiosos para a construção de um estado socialista no Vietnã, tais como a promoção de lideranças eficazes, gestão ética e educação para todos. O artigo tem por objetivo principal oferecer uma análise reflexiva de como as ideias políticas de Platão podem contribuir teórica e praticamente para o desenvolvimento do Vietnã. (shrink)

In the university system today, co-research may be a decolonising strategy. We evaluate teaching a ‘Modernization and Social Change’ course in Vietnam as an experiment in co-research anthropology t...

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Buddhist-Christian Studies 20 (2000) 127-150 [Access article in PDF] They Who Burned Themselves for Peace: Quaker and Buddhist Self-Immolators during the Vietnam War Sallie B. KingJames Madison UniversityNhat Chi Mai was a lay disciple of Thich Nhat Hanh and member of the Order of Interbeing, an Engaged Buddhist order founded by Nhat Hanh. On May 16, 1967, Vesak, the celebration of the birth of the Buddha, she burned herself (...) to death outside the Tu Nghiem Temple, a nunnery. An idealistic young student with much to live for, she sacrificed herself in an effort to bring the war to an end. In a letter to the U.S. government she wrote, I offer my body as a torch to dissipate the dark to waken love among men to give peace to Vietnam the one who burns herself for peace. 1In her farewell letter to Thich Nhat Hanh she wrote, "Thay, don't worry too much. We will have peace soon." 2On November 2, 1965, Norman Morrison, a devout Quaker and ardent pacifist, drove from Baltimore to Washington and burned himself to death at the Pentagon, at a spot estimated to be 40 to 100 feet from the window of Robert S. McNamara, then Secretary of Defense and one of the chief American prosecutors of the war. Shortly before his death, he wrote to his wife, "For weeks even months I have been praying only that I be shown what I must do. This morning with no warning I was shown.... Know that I love thee but must act...." 3 Morrison took his baby daughter, Emily, along with him and held her in his arms as he prepared for his act. Somehow--accounts differ as to how it happened--she was separated from her father before the flames engulfed him and she emerged entirely unharmed, though her clothing smelled strongly of the kerosene with which Morrison had soaked himself. 4There were others who burned themselves to death during the war in Vietnam. The venerable Buddhist monk Thich Quang Duc was the first. On June 11, 1963, [End Page 127] at a downtown crossroads in Saigon, he sat in the lotus posture and, in a state of meditative control, burned himself to death in protest of the Diem regime's repression of the Buddhist religion. Many Vietnamese Buddhist monks and nuns followed his example; I do not know all their names, or exactly how many they were.In America, to my knowledge, eight people burned themselves to death during the war. Two were Quakers: Norman Morrison and Alice Herz. Roger LaPorte, a former Trappist seminarian who had become a Catholic worker, burned himself to death one week after Norman Morrison. The others were: Hiroko Hayasaki, a Japanese-American Buddhist; Erik Thoen, a student of Zen Buddhism; another university student, George Winne; a high school student, Ronald Brazee; and Florence Beaumont, described as a "housewife." A number of others attempted self-immolation but survived. 5In this paper I will focus upon the self-immolations of Norman Morrison and Nhat Chi Mai. I will also have a few comments on Thich Quang Duc. My remarks are intended, however, to have relevance to all the Buddhist and Quaker self-immolators. 6Let us now consider in more detail some of the features of the self-immolations of Norman Morrison and Nhat Chi Mai, and some of the issues they pose to the Quaker and Buddhist communities, respectively. Precipitating Events While neither act was the result of a moment's impulse, we still would do well to ask what events most proximately precipitated the two self-immolations. In Norman Morrison's case, the precipitating events were two. The morning of the day he immolated himself he read a report of the American bombing of a village in Vietnam. Paris Match had published an interview with a French priest, recuperating in a Saigon clinic, who had witnessed and survived the bombing raid. The priest said, "I have seen my faithful burned up in napalm.... I have seen... (shrink)

Since 2013, Vietnam has implemented a plan to reform the whole education sector. However, there is little understanding on the status of educational research in Vietnam, which may lay the foundation for such plan. Thus, this research aims to analyze the whole picture of educational research from Vietnam, as seen from the Clarivate Web of Science (WOS) database: 215 publications were recorded, ranging from 1991 to 2018. These 215 publications were further analyzed from five perspectives: 1) number of publications by (...) year; 2) research fields and levels of education; 3) top institutions with the highest number of publications; 4) international collaboration; and 5) quality. Some of the most notable results are: 1) the educational sciences in Vietnam have been still under-developed until recently; 2) among different research topics research among educational sciences, some (e.g., Vocational Education and Training or Early Childhood Education) seemed to be overlooked whereas others (e.g., Higher Education and Teaching and Learning) seemed to receive more attention from educational scholars; 3) all the most major education – specialized universities did not appear among the top five institutions with highest number of publications; 4) Australia, Thailand, the USA, New Zealand and China were the countries with the highest number of co-publications with Vietnamese researchers; and 5) The majority of publications belonged to low-ranked journals. Implications would be withdrawn for Vietnamese policymakers, education leaders, educational researchers and teachers in order to adjust their policies and/or action plans; thus, enhancing the performance and impacts of educational research in the future. (shrink)

Background Ethical principles behind prioritization in healthcare are continuously relevant. However, applying ethical principles during times of increased need, such as during the COVID-19 pandemic, is challenging. Also, little is known about nursing home nurses’ prioritizations in their work to achieve well-being and health for nursing home residents. Aim The aim of this study was to explore nursing home nurses’ priority-setting for older nursing home residents in Sweden during the COVID-19 pandemic. Research design, participants, and research context We conducted a (...) qualitative interview study. Data were collected through in-depth interviews (retrospective self-reports) between February and May 2021 with 21 nursing home nurses. To help respondents to recall their memories, we used the critical incident technique (CIT). We analyzed data within the theoretical framework and the methodological orientation of content analysis. Ethical considerations Written and verbal consent was obtained before the interviews, and information was given to participants informing them that participation was entirely voluntary. The Swedish Ethical Review Agency gave an advisory opinion stating that there were no ethical objections to the research project (Dnr. 2020-05649). Findings We identified an overarching theme—nursing home nurses struggling on multiple fronts, “just do it”—and seven categories: striving for survival and caring about a dignified death; responding sensitively to relatives’ expectations; ranking the urgency of needed care; responding to input from different actors; combating the spread of infection in unconventional ways; taking the lead and doing what is required; and following the ideals of person-centered nursing. Conclusions Nurses’ priority-setting for older nursing homes residents during the COVID-19 pandemic meant strain and struggle. In some cases, nurses had taken responsibility for priorities falling outside their statutory powers. Different demands and interests affected nurses’ priorities. Nursing home nurses need organizational and managerial support to prioritize. (shrink)

On the aesthetic tastes of the youth in Ho Chi Minh City.

Separation of powers is one of the ideas with profound theoretical and practical significance, especially in the field of political science. The birth of the theory of separation of powers marked the transition from the barbaric use of power in authoritarian societies to the exercise of civilized power in democratic societies. Therefore, separation of powers is considered an objective necessity in democratic states, a condition to ensure the promotion of liberal values, and a criterion for assessing the existence and development (...) of the Rule of Law where people's sovereignty plays a paramount role. On the way to perfecting political thinking, the theory of separation of powers has developed into a complete system in the main philosophy of John Locke. Within the scope of the article, the author focuses on analyzing Locke's ideology of separation of powers in terms of the nature of separation of powers, the basis and some principles of power division, and the roles of the different parts of government power and the relationship between them. (shrink)

This study aims to determine whether political connections and foreign investments influence the level of Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) disclosure among listed firms. To empirically explore these relationships, we utilized a novel dataset of 111 listed manufacturing firms on the HOSE stock exchange in Vietnam, covering the period from 2015 to 2022. Content analysis was conducted to assess the levels of ESG disclosure, while ordered logit and random effect estimators, along with several robustness checks, were applied to quantify the (...) impacts of political connections and foreign investments. Our findings reveal that foreign connections are positively correlated with higher levels of ESG disclosure, whereas politically connected firms are associated with negative impacts and lower levels of ESG disclosure compared to those with foreign connections. These results address the research questions effectively and contribute to the literature by offering an updated view of current ESG practices in Vietnam, an emerging economy with evolving ESG norms. The findings provide both theoretical and practical contributions to the understanding of ESG disclosure, with important implications for policy-makers and business leaders. (shrink)

The Diamond Sutra is one of the earliest and most treasured of the Perfection of Wisdom Sutras and had a wide influence on the development of Zen Buddhism. There has been, in recent years, great interest in one particular form of sentences that repeatedly occur in the sutra, sentences of the form “A is not A, therefore it is A”. These sentences display what has been called the “logic of not” or the “logic of affirmation-in-negation”. They are of special interest (...) since they do not only encapsulate one of the central insights of Zen Buddhism, that of nonduality, but at the same time seem to go against one of the most orthodox laws of logic in Western philosophy, the law of identity. This paper discusses the interpretation of these “diamond sentences” by the Vietnamese Zen monk Thich Nhat Hanh. I present Thich Nhat Hanh’s interpretation of the diamond sentences in terms of interbeing and go on to argue that and explain how, on his interpretation, the validity of the law of identity is indeed rejected. Finally, I spell out consequences for formulating a “logic of Zen” and for a related debate about the validity of the law of non-contradiction in Zen. (shrink)

Objectives: The official implementation of clinical pharmacy in Vietnam has arrived relatively late, resulting in various stressors. This study aims to evaluate job stress level and suggest viable solutions.Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted on clinical pharmacists in 128 hospitals in Ho Chi Minh City. Job stress questions were derived from the Healthcare Profession Stress Inventory.Results: A total of 197 CPs participated, giving a response rate of 82.4%. Participants were found to have moderate job stress with an overall mean stress (...) score of 1.5 and stress rate of 52.8%. The sample size was statistically adequate and the HPSI was valid and reliable. Patient care responsibility was the main stressor, especially in public hospitals, followed by job conflicts. Lack of experience, low income, and inability to participate in clinical ward rounds caused significant stress to CPs regarding job recognition and job uncertainty. More practice-oriented training programs in bachelor curricula and clinical practice should be applied to help CPs gain more experience, self-confidence, and diminish job stress.Conclusion: CPs in HCMC have moderate stress. More practice-oriented training programs should be prioritized to lessen stress for CPs. (shrink)

In this text, I explore the issue of the accuracy of experiential memories, focusing on the fit between the imagistic elements of an experiential memory and the experience that is remembered. My starting point is the taxonomy of memory, which clarifies what I am talking about, as I will only focus on long-term memories that involve mental imagery. Having clarified this, I will move on to a discussion of the normative requirements of memory, focusing on the requirement that a memory (...) conforms to what was previously experienced by the subject. I then discuss how this requirement is treated by two contemporary philosophical views on the nature of memory: causalism and simulationism. Next, I discuss two ways memory can adjust to the past: by adjusting to the remembered event (alethism) or the past perception of the event (authenticism). Finally, I present descriptivism and pictorialism, two views on how the mental imagery that constitutes an experiential memory can adjust to the past, and defend the explanatory superiority of pictorialism. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:We Walk the Path Together: Learning from Thich Nhat Hanh and Meister EckhartSeung Hee KangWe Walk The Path Together: Learning from Thich Nhat Hanh and Meister Eckhart. By Brian J. Pierce. New York: Maryknoll, 2005. 202 pp.Being that he is a contemplative, Pierce’s Trinitarian Christian love beautifully manifests itself in this book in his art of interdialoguing on the Buddhist-Christian religious traditions. Pierce’s manner of interdialoguing resonates with (...) what Ann Belford Ulanov also attempts: “I am writing not about how to prove that God exists but rather about what happens religiously when psyche and soul create a space for conversation [End Page 178] out of which life can flow.” 1 If someone asks whether Pierce and Ulanov point to two different absolute realities, my response would be, “Absolutely not!” The sacred inner space that Pierce points to, in light of the two contemporary mystics from different religious traditions, namely Thich Nhat Hanh and Meister Eckhart, also reminds me of Lao Tzu’s wisdom that permeates the Tao Te Ching, specifically in his concept of “useful emptiness.” 2We Walk the Path Together is neither an abstract account nor sheer philosophical speculation. The whole of the book is rooted in Pierce’s faith-based lived experience (pp. 1, 3, 5, 7, 11, 113, 163); this renders the book life-giving and deeply ecological in terms of its transcendence of either/or dichotomies.Chapter 1 summarizes the meaning and art of dialogue. Pierce utilizes mystical language to illustrate what the dialogue is. For Pierce, dialogue connotes “a mutual giving and receiving, and it posits a profound sense of being of one heart and mind” (p. 3). Pierce extends his personal experience of a vow of obedience into the meaning of dialogue. For Pierce, this vow means to “transcend any illusion of separateness” and thus “obedience liberates him from his tiny world of ego” (p. 4). In the process of dialogue, according to Pierce, “our hearts are challenged to grow larger, all-inclusive and universal” (p. 8). This expansion of the heart is what mystics call “magnanimity.” As Pierce is acutely aware, “magnanimity is one of life’s un-planned for graces; it teaches us to see and hear and learn things that we never dreamed were possible” (p. 9).Chapter 2 discusses mindfulness as a gateway to eternity. Pierce asserts that home is everywhere in the present moment; it is where freedom is possible. This particular point echoes with what Thomas Merton spoke about in reference to the prodigal son who turned away from his father: “sin is our refusal to be what we are, a rejection of our spiritual reality hidden in the mystery of God” (p. 23). However, when the prodigal son was restored his senses, he was able to attune himself back to present moment: “I’ll get up and go to my father” (cited by Pierce, ibid.). He became free from his sin, returning home. In this chapter, Pierce highlights the words of the mystics (St. Irenaeus, St. John of the Cross, Brother Lawrence, St. Augustine, Jan van Ruusbroec, and St. Catherine de Siena) who lived this present moment in order to help the readers understand the intrinsic relationship between our mindfulness of the present moment and eternity. He argues that Buddhist teachings on mindfulness and Christianity’s tradition concerning the kingdom of God are mutually informative (pp. 19, 21).In chapter 3, Pierce expands the meaning of present moment through its association with breathing; being present is not a concept, but a living reality, as we experience the Holy Spirit in our breathing practice, such as centering prayer and meditation (p. 36). Pierce carefully states, “contemplation is authentic only if it flows out in loving-kindness to others. When we breathe in all the spiritual energy of the universe, thus, we literally implode—a spiritual ego intoxication” (p. 40). Pierce explains further what contemplation means; breathing in the Holy Spirit and breathing out the Holy Spirit may mean two separate phenomena. Contemplation is, for Pierce, authentic, only when the Spirit that is breathed in reaches out to our community. [End Page 179] This is also Pierce’s ecological aspect... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Buddhist-Christian Studies 20 (2000) 115-125 [Access article in PDF] Pretending to Be Buddhist and Christian: Thich Nhat Hanh and the Two Truths of Religious Identity Jeffrey CarlsonDePaul University Nagarjuna replies: "The teaching by the Buddhas of the dharma has recourse to two truths: / The world-ensconced truth and the truth which is the highest sense. / Those who do not know the distribution (vibhagam) of the two kinds of (...) truth / Do not know the profound 'point' (tattva) in the teaching of the Buddha. / The highest sense [of the truth] is not taught apart from practical behavior, / And without having understood the highest sense one cannot understand nirvana. / Emptiness, having been dimly perceived, utterly destroys the slow-witted. / It is like a snake wrongly grasped or [magical] knowledge incorrectly applied." 1I would like to offer a response to Thich Nhat Hanh's book Living Buddha, Living Christ, a response which suggests that Nhat Hanh embodies and propounds this classical Buddhist notion of "two truths," in a way that sheds much light on the very notion of "religious identity."The fact that Buddhist teachings involve two kinds of truths is a familiar one in Buddhist studies. T.R.V. Murti describes worldly truth as "truth so called; truth as conventionally believed in common parlance.... It is the truth that does not do any violence to what obtains in our everyday world, being in close conformity with linguistic conventions and ideas." 2 Edward Conze notes that "... in some places the Buddhas have spoken of a 'self', in others they have taught a 'notself', and in addition they have also taught that there is neither a self nor a notself. Candrakirti convincingly explains this aphorism by pointing out that the Buddhas are physicians rather than teachers, that they always consider the mentality and spiritual maturity of their interlocutors, and vary their teachings accordingly." 3Ultimate truth, again characterized by Streng, is "the realization of dependent coorigination whereby there is no attachment to fabricated 'things'--not even to the formulation of dependent coorigination." 4 [End Page 115] 1. Thich Nhat Hanh on Conventional Truth and Religious Identity Thich Nhat Hanh writes: "We need roots to be able to stand straight and grow strong. When young people come to Plum Village, I always encourage them to practice in a way that will help them go back to their own tradition and get re-rooted. If they succeed at becoming reintegrated, they will be an important instrument in transforming and renewing their tradition." 5 An advocate of interreligious dialogue, he nonetheless maintains that "sharing does not mean wanting others to abandon their own spiritual roots and embrace your faith. That would be cruel. People are stable and happy only when they are firmly rooted in their own tradition and culture. To uproot them would make them suffer. There are already enough people uprooted from their tradition today, and they suffer greatly, wandering around like hungry ghosts, looking for something to fill their spiritual needs. We must help them return to their tradition." 6He cites the suffering caused by Christian missionaries who, he writes, "came to Vietnam several hundred years ago, [and] urged us to abandon the cult of ancestral worship and to abandon our Buddhist tradition. Later, when they offered to help us in refugee camps in Thailand and Hong Kong, they also urged us to give up our roots. The good will to help and to save us was there, but the correct understanding was not. People cannot be happy if they are rootless." 7Nhat Hanh tells a compelling story of six children he met in Sri Lanka. Coming upon them Nhat Hanh began chanting in Pali, "I take refuge in the Buddha. I take refuge in the Dharma. I take refuge in the Sangha." Nhat Hanh recounts that four of the children joined their palms and chanted, while the other two stood respectfully. "I motioned to the two children who were not chanting to join us. They smiled, placed their palms together and chanted in Pali, 'I... (shrink)

According to most accounts of trust, you can only trust other people (or groups of people). To trust is to think that another has goodwill, or something to that effect. I sketch a different form of trust: the unquestioning attitude. What it is to trust, in this sense, is to settle one’s mind about something, to stop questioning it. To trust is to rely on a resource while suspending deliberation over its reliability. Trust lowers the barrier of monitoring, challenging, checking, (...) and questioning. Trust sets up open pipelines between yourself and parts of the external world. Trust permits external resources to have a similar relationship to one as one’s internal cognitive faculties. This creates efficiency, but at the price of exquisite vulnerability. We must trust in this way because we are cognitively limited beings in a cognitively overwhelming world. Crucially, we can hold the unquestioning attitude towards objects and technologies. When I trust my climbing rope, I stop worrying about its reliability. When I trust my online calendaring system, I simply go to the events indicated, without question. But, one might worry, how could one ever hold such a normatively loaded attitude as trust towards mere objects? How could it ever make sense to feel betrayed by an object? Trust is our engine for expanding and outsourcing our agency — for binding external processes into our practical selves. Thus, we can be betrayed by our smartphones in the same way that we can be betrayed by our memory. When we trust, we try to make something a part of our agency, and we are betrayed when our part lets us down. To unquestioningly trust something is to let it in—to attempt to bring it inside one’s practical functioning. This suggests a new form of gullibility: agential gullibility, which occurs when agents too hastily and carelessly integrate external resources into their own agency. (shrink)

Hostile epistemology is the study of how environmental features exploit our cognitive vulnerabilities. I am particularly interested in those vulnerabilities arise from the basic character of our epistemic lives. We are finite beings with limited cognitive resources, perpetually forced to reasoning a rush. I focus on two sources of unavoidable vulnerability. First, we need to use cognitive shortcuts and heuristics to manage our limited time and attention. But hostile forces can always game the gap between the heuristic and the ideal. (...) Second, we need to trust others, and trust makes us vulnerable. In particular, we need to trust experts whose expertise lies beyond our individual ability to vet. So we must rely on various imperfect signals and proxies, like institutional affiliation, to manage our trust. We are forced to use these imperfect and exploitable forms of reasoning, in order to cope with a cognitively overwhelming world. I present the hostile epistemology framework as a counterbalance to vice epistemology, which tends to locate responsibility for bad beliefs in the character of the believer. I draw two conclusions from my analysis. First: suppose we accept that that only communities and institutions can know about the world. This deeply social approach doesn’t solve the problem of expert identification. The individual still faces a problem: given their incomplete understanding, how should the individual pick which group to trust? Second: we might have hoped to get some kind of static picture of the right principles of reasoning — but hostile epistemology presents a different picture. We have to use risky heuristics and shortcuts, which hostile forces can game and exploit. We can respond by shifting to a different set of heuristics, but this simply shifts the location of our vulnerabilities. These new heuristics are also exploitable. There is no end to this, only a constant struggle to adapt. Limited beings in a hostile epistemic environment are locked in an unending epistemic arms race. (shrink)

Games occupy a unique and valuable place in our lives. Game designers do not simply create worlds; they design temporary selves. Game designers set what our motivations are in the game and what our abilities will be. Thus: games are the art form of agency. By working in the artistic medium of agency, games can offer a distinctive aesthetic value. They support aesthetic experiences of deciding and doing. -/- And the fact that we play games shows something remarkable about us. (...) Our agency is more fluid than we might have thought. In playing a game, we take on temporary ends; we submerge ourselves temporarily in an alternate agency. Games turn out to be a vessel for communicating different modes of agency, for writing them down and storing them. Games create an archive of agencies. And playing games is how we familiarize ourselves with different modes of agency, which helps us develop our capacity to fluidly change our own style of agency. (shrink)

ObjectiveThe goal of the study was to explore the relationship between parent–children relationships related to using the internet among kids and potentially associated factors.Materials and MethodsA sample of 1.216 Vietnamese students between the ages of 12 and 18 agreed to participate in the cross-sectional online survey. Data collected included socioeconomic characteristics and internet use status of participants, their perceived changes in relationship and communication between parents and children since using the internet, and parental control toward the child’s internet use. An (...) Ordered Logistic Regression was carried out to determine factors associated with parent–children relationship since using the internet.ResultsThe characteristics of the relationship between children and their parents since using the Internet were divided into three levels: deterioration, stability, and improvement. The topics that children most often communicate with their parents include learning, housework, and future directions. Two-way interactive activities, such as supporting parents to use the Internet, have a positive impact on the parent–child relationship. Stubborn parental control, such as establishing rules about contact or allowing Internet access and setting up global positioning system to track negatively affecting parent–child relationships.ConclusionFindings indicated that changes in the quality of the parent–child relationship were self-assessed by participants regard to kids’ internet use, especially in the COVID-19 epidemic context. Educational campaigns and programs to raise awareness of parents as to the dangers and negative influences that their children may encounter online, psychology of children’s behaviors and effects of different responding strategies are recommended. (shrink)

Using an institutional perspective, this paper investigates how consumers in Western developed and Southeast Asian emerging markets respond to fashion brands’ moral transgressions and how consumers’ moral rationalization tendencies vary across the two markets. The study employs multimethod analyses, including cross-national secondary data from 12 countries and experimental data from 940 German and Vietnamese consumers. In a non-transgression context, the multivariate analyses show that Western developed-market consumers embrace higher ethical standards (Study 1A), tend to seek collective action against prevalent immoral (...) behaviors in society (Study 1B), and are more critical in evaluating fashion brand ethicality than Southeast Asian emerging-market consumers (Study 2). However, in a transgression context, the moderated mediation analyses reveal that consumers largely do not differ in their direct devaluation of fashion brand ethicality and subsequent price considerations (Study 3) across six transgression scenarios (i.e., worker abuse, child labor, racist advertising, weight discrimination, climate change, and environmental pollution). Interestingly, moral rationalization processes appear to be more frequent and consequential in the Southeast Asian emerging market, while they either do not occur or are significantly weaker in the Western developed market. The results provide theoretical and practical implications for ethical business practices in the fashion industry based on market differences in regulatory frameworks, cognitive considerations, and social norms. (shrink)

Our life with art is suffused with trust. We don’t just trust one another’s aesthetic testimony; we trust one another’s aesthetic actions. Audiences trust artists to have made it worth their while; artists trust audiences to put in the effort. Without trust, audiences would have little reason to put in the effort to understand difficult and unfamiliar art. I offer a theory of aesthetic trust, which highlights the importance of trust in aesthetic sincerity. We trust in another’s aesthetic sincerity when (...) we rely on them to fulfill their commitments to act for aesthetic reasons — rather than for, say, financial, social, or political reasons. We feel most thoroughly betrayed by an artist, not when they make bad art, but when they sell out. This teaches us something about the nature of trust in general. According to many standard theories, trust involves thinking the trusted to be cooperative or good-natured. But trust in aesthetic sincerity is different. We trust artists to be true to their own aesthetic sensibility, which might involve selfishly ignoring their audience’s needs. Why do we care so much about an artist’s sincerity, rather than merely trusting them to make good art? We emphasize sincerity when wish to encourage originality, rather than to demand success along predictable lines. And we ask for sincerity when our goal is to discover a shared sensibility. In moral life, we often try to force convergence through coordinated effort. But in aesthetic life, we often hope for the lovely discovery that our sensibilities were similar all along. And for that we need to ask for sincerity, rather than overt coordination. (shrink)

Games have a complex, and seemingly paradoxical structure: they are both competitive and cooperative, and the competitive element is required for the cooperative element to work out. They are mechanisms for transforming competition into cooperation. Several contemporary philosophers of sport have located the primary mechanism of conversion in the mental attitudes of the players. I argue that these views cannot capture the phenomenological complexity of game-play, nor the difficulty and moral complexity of achieving cooperation through game-play. In this paper, I (...) present a different account of the relationship between competition and cooperation. My view is a distributed view of the conversion: success depends on a large number of features. First, the players must achieve the right motivational state: playing for the sake of the struggle, rather than to win. Second, successful transformation depends on a large number of extra-mental features, including good game design, and social and institutional features. (shrink)

What is a game? What are we doing when we play a game? What is the value of playing games? Several different philosophical subdisciplines have attempted to answer these questions using very distinctive frameworks. Some have approached games as something like a text, deploying theoretical frameworks from the study of narrative, fiction, and rhetoric to interrogate games for their representational content. Others have approached games as artworks and asked questions about the authorship of games, about the ontology of the work (...) and its performance. Yet others, from the philosophy of sport, have focused on normative issues of fairness, rule application, and competition. The primary purpose of this article is to provide an overview of several different philosophical approaches to games and, hopefully, demonstrate the relevance and value of the different approaches to each other. Early academic attempts to cope with games tried to treat games as a subtype of narrative and to interpret games exactly as one might interpret a static, linear narrative. A faction of game studies, self-described as “ludologists,” argued that games were a substantially novel form and could not be treated with traditional tools for narrative analysis. In traditional narrative, an audience is told and interprets the story, where in a game, the player enacts and creates the story. Since that early debate, theorists have attempted to offer more nuanced accounts of how games might achieve similar ends to more traditional texts. For example, games might be seen as a novel type of fiction, which uses interactive techniques to achieve immersion in a fictional world. Alternately, games might be seen as a new way to represent causal systems, and so a new way to criticize social and political entities. Work from contemporary analytic philosophy of art has, on the other hand, asked questions whether games could be artworks and, if so, what kind. Much of this debate has concerned the precise nature of the artwork, and the relationship between the artist and the audience. Some have claimed that the audience is a cocreator of the artwork, and so games are a uniquely unfinished and cooperative art form. Others have claimed that, instead, the audience does not help create the artwork; rather, interacting with the artwork is how an audience member appreciates the artist's finished production. Other streams of work have focused less on the game as a text or work, and more on game play as a kind of activity. One common view is that game play occurs in a “magic circle.” Inside the magic circle, players take on new roles, follow different rules, and actions have different meanings. Actions inside the magic circle do not have their usual consequences for the rest of life. Enemies of the magic circle view have claimed that the view ignores the deep integration of game life from ordinary life and point to gambling, gold farming, and the status effects of sports. Philosophers of sport, on the other hand, have approached games with an entirely different framework. This has lead into investigations about the normative nature of games—what guides the applications of rules and how those rules might be applied, interpreted, or even changed. Furthermore, they have investigated games as social practices and as forms of life. (shrink)

IntroductionThis study aimed to explore the mental wellbeing profiles and their related factors among urban young adults in Vietnam.MethodsA cross-sectional study was conducted in Hanoi, which is the capital of Vietnam. There were 356 Vietnamese who completed the Mental Health Inventory-5 questionnaire. The Latent Profile Analysis was used to identify the subgroups of mental wellbeing through five items of the MHI-5 scale as the continuous variable. Multinomial logistic regression was used to determine factors related to subgroups.ResultsThree classes represented three levels (...) of MHI-5 score, which included “Poor mental health,” “Fair mental health,” and “Good mental health,” were, respectively, 14.3, 46.6, and 39.0%. Compared to a low household economy, participants with an average household economy had 2.11 and 4.79 times higher odds of being in a good mental health class relative to fair and poor mental health classes. Respondents with more than two acute symptoms had 3.85 times higher odds of being in a good mental health class relative to a poor mental health class, as compared to those without acute symptoms. Regarding the measurement of the Perceived Social Support Scale, people having support from their family had 1.80 and 2.23 times higher odds of being in classes of fair and good mental health relative to the poor mental health class; and participants having friend support also had 1.87 times higher odds of being in a good mental health class compared with the fair mental health class, as the MSPSS score increased by 1 unit. People with Rosenberg’s self-esteem scale increased by 1 score, those who had 1.17, 1.26, and 1.47 times higher odds of being in a good compared to fair mental health class, fair compared to poor mental health class, and good compared to poor mental health class, respectively.ConclusionOur findings were given to promote a new classification method for mental health screening among the general population. The current findings could be used as evidence to develop policies and plans that focus on encouraging early screening for mental health problems among the general young population in the future. (shrink)

Objective Routine prenatal screening for Down syndrome challenges professional non-directiveness and patient autonomy in daily clinical practices. This paper aims to describe how professionals negotiate their role when a pregnant woman asks them to become involved in the decision-making process implied by screening.Methods Forty-one semi-structured interviews were conducted with gynaecologists–obstetricians and midwives in a large Swiss city.Results Three professional profiles were constructed along a continuum that defines the relative distance or proximity towards patients’ demands for professional involvement in the decision-making (...) process. The first profile insists on enforcing patient responsibility, wherein the healthcare provider avoids any form of professional participation. A second profile defends the idea of a shared decision making between patients and professionals. The third highlights the intervening factors that justify professionals’ involvement in decisions.Conclusions These results illustrate various applications of the principle of autonomy and highlight the complexity of the doctor–patient relationship amidst medical decisions today. (shrink)

This study investigates the effect of each component of CEO compensation, including cash-based component (salary and bonus), equity-based component (stock grant and stock option), and other perks on disclosure of corporate social responsibility (CSR) information of global firms. The study uses 2SLS IV estimation method and a sample of 580 US-based firms in a seven-year period. The study finds that equity-based remuneration has a significant and positive impact on a firm's CSR disclosure while CEO salary, bonus, and other perquisites have (...) significant detrimental effects on CSR disclosure. The paper indicates that a CEO's motivation for CSR reporting might arise from stock grant and option; meanwhile, salary, bonus and other perks could demotivate the CEO in this regard. Our findings offer insight into designing CEO compensation packages to meet shareholders' interests and stakeholders' expectations for a sustainable business. (shrink)

We offer a critical assessment of the “exclusion argument” against free will, which may be summarized by the slogan: “My brain made me do it, therefore I couldn't have been free”. While the exclusion argument has received much attention in debates about mental causation (“could my mental states ever cause my actions?”), it is seldom discussed in relation to free will. However, the argument informally underlies many neuroscientific discussions of free will, especially the claim that advances in neuroscience seriously challenge (...) our belief in free will. We introduce two distinct versions of the argument, discuss several unsuccessful responses to it, and then present our preferred response. This involves showing that a key premise – the “exclusion principle” – is false under what we take to be the most natural account of causation in the context of agency: the difference-making account. We finally revisit the debate about neuroscience and free will. (shrink)

Neste dossiê em homenagem a Marcelo Pimenta Marques, gostaria de apontar dois aspectos que se complementam na vida e na obra de Marques; a saber, um de ser o meu melhor exemplo de docente-orientador-gente, que não apenas vive, mas sente a vida vivida e a reflete a partir, também, de um escopo de pesquisa; a pesquisa é o segundo aspecto. Se aponto dois aspectos, aqui me fiarei em um, sua interpretação a respeito da obra platônica que aparece na República, mais (...) especificamente, no Livro VI, mais especificamente ainda, na linha dividida. Nesse itinerário, conto com os artigos e capítulos de livros disponíveis acerca da interpretação de Marques sobre a República e da obra platônica, ela mesma. Palavras-chave: Platão; Linha dividida; MPM; Interpreting the divided line from the thought of Marcelo Pimenta Marques Abstract: In this dossier in honor of Marcelo Pimenta Marques, I would like to point out two aspects that complement each other in the life and work of Marques; namely, one of being my best example of a professor-supervisor-human being, who not only live, but feel the life lived and reflect on it from a research scope as well; the research is the second aspect. If I point out two aspects, here I will rely on one, his interpretation of the Platonic work that appears in the Republic, more specifically, in Book VI, and even more specifically, in the divided line. In this itinerary, I rely on the articles and book chapters available about Marques' interpretation of the Republic and the Platonic work itself. Key-words: Plato; divided line; MPM Interpretando la línea dividida desde el pensamento de Marcelo Pimenta Marques Resumen: En este dossier en honor a Marcelo Pimenta Marques, quisiera señalar dos aspectos que se complementan en la vida y obra de Marques; a saber, uno de ser mi mejor ejemplo de un maestro-tutor-pueblo, que no sólo vive, sino que siente la vida vivida y la reflexiona también desde el ámbito de la investigación; La investigación es el segundo aspecto. Si señalo dos aspectos, aquí me apoyaré en uno, su interpretación de la obra platónica que aparece en la República, más concretamente, en el Libro VI, y más concretamente aún, en la línea dividida. En este itinerario me apoyo en los artículos y capítulos de libros disponibles sobre la interpretación marquesina de la República y de la propia obra platónica. Palavra clave: Platón; línea dividida; MPM Data de registro: 01/08/2023 Data de aceite: 18/10/2023. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:The Blue Pearl: The Efficacy of Teaching Mindfulness Practices to College StudentsDeborah J. Haynes, Katie Irvine, and Mindy BridgesBetween fall 2003 and spring 2011 I integrated contemplative practices into ten courses with a total of 877 students. Nine of these courses carried credit for the core undergraduate curriculum, either in literature and arts or ideals and values, and students elected my courses from a menu of options. Individual courses (...) ranged from 12 to 409 students. During two of these years, I conducted detailed human subject research using a number of surveys, gathering both quantitative and qualitative data with first-year undergraduates on their experiences with contemplative pedagogy. These courses dealt specifically with art and religion, focusing on traditions where the visual arts are intricately connected to religious practice. I gathered more subjective data in all of the other courses, including large lecture courses on world art from 1500 to the present. In general, my students were not majors in art or religious studies, but came from many disciplines within the arts, social sciences, and sciences, including business and engineering. This essay describes the process and results of the research I conducted with two undergraduate assistants, Katie Irvine and Mindy Bridges. Besides summarizing the findings, I also describe student responses to teaching a specific mindfulness practice—the bow—within a large lecture course with undergraduates. It is notable how little actual data exists about student experiences, and this prompted me to undertake the research that forms the basis for this essay.1I begin with a few comments on my understanding of contemplative or mindfulness practice and my role as researcher. There is no single way to describe or engage in contemplative practice. The Latin contemplari means to observe, consider, or gaze attentively. This definition gives clues about the varied forms of contemplative practice, which include sitting, standing, walking, and lying down; using attitudes of not doing; deep listening, pondering, and radical questioning; guided imagery and active imagination; exercises with the body; focusing techniques such as those developed by Eugene Gendlin; concentrated language experiments with freewriting, poetry, and journals; beholding; and creation of visual images to represent such experiences.2 The [End Page 63] word mindfulness is often used to describe contemplative practice. In its most basic form, it means moment-by-moment present awareness, which is available to everyone, regardless of religious or spiritual orientation.Broadly understood as methods to develop concentration, to deepen understanding and insight, and to cultivate awareness and compassion, these practices can have a profound impact on a student’s experience both in college and beyond. Specifically, teaching students techniques of awareness, concentration, and means of disciplining their attention is absolutely essential in our era of fragmentation, ever-increasing speed, multitasking, and continuously interrupted attention. While contemplative practices are rooted in the world’s religious traditions, I often tell parents and students that the application of these practices in a secular educational context can enhance the educational experience in unique ways. Students develop new techniques of awareness, they learn to refine their perceptual and observational skills, and they are encouraged to take chances and to foster attitudes such as curiosity and wonder rather than cynicism about the world in which we live.Contemplative PedagogyIntroducing contemplative practices into the classroom results in new educational practices and pedagogies. For example, in a course titled The Dialogue of Art and Religion my students learn about Russian Orthodox icons, Himalayan Buddhist thangkas, and Navajo sand paintings through studying cultural and social history, religion, formal visual analysis, and creative processes. I define this interdisciplinary teaching as a form of comparative visual studies. I normally teach this class to eighteen or twenty first-year college students. Students also learn about the practices of prayer and meditation that are central to Christian, Buddhist, and Native American traditions through sustained reading and discussion. They read accessible books about contemplative practice such as Thich Nhat Hanh’s The Miracle of Mindfulness.3 In each class, we practice simple techniques such as bowing, sitting in silence, breath awareness, and daily writing exercises.Over the past decade my students have talked about how these mindfulness exercises help to foster an atmosphere of respect, noting... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:The Great Awakening: A Buddhist Social TheoryChristopher IvesThe Great Awakening: A Buddhist Social Theory. By David R. Loy. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2003. 228 pp.In recent decades, the Dalai Lama, Thich Nhat Hanh, the Buddhist Peace Fellowship, the International Network of Engaged Buddhists, and other "Engaged Buddhists" have been responding to a range of social, political, and economic issues. To date, however, they have not coupled their wide-ranging and (...) sustained praxis with an equal measure of systematic, rigorous theory. Granted, facing such urgent problems as war, poverty, and environmental degradation, few if any of us would urge them to put their activism on hold until they clarify their theoretical foundations. Yet given how these Buddhists have diverged on such issues as abortion, homosexuality, intoxicants, possible legitimate uses of violence, and sexual contact between Buddhist teachers and students, further theoretical labor would sharpen their praxis and develop Buddhist social ethics.In this respect, David Loy's The Great Awakening deserves a close read. Though not pursuing the degree of systematic theorizing implied by the subtitle, A Buddhist Social Theory, Loy takes a significant step in that direction. After expounding on Buddhist dukkha (suffering) and linking it to "social dukkha" (ch. 1), Loy offers discerning treatment of poverty (ch. 2), globalization (ch. 3), corporations (ch. 4), the "war on terror" (ch. 5), crime and punishment (ch. 6), violence (ch. 7), technology (ch. 8), and worldviews that exacerbate or help resolve our environmental crisis (ch.9). [End Page 170]Drawing on two of his previous books, Nonduality and Lack and Transcendence, Loy deploys the constructs of nonduality and lack to grapple with these issues. Working over the "three marks of existence" (suffering, impermanence, and no-self), Loy sketches adroitly how the vague recognition that we lack any substantial self or soul leads us to engage in fearful "reality projects," attempts to "ground" ourselves "by modifying the world" (p. 164) or by objectifying ourselves as something real in the world (p. 22). This response to "lack" is exacerbated by dualistic ways of knowing: "The sense of duality between ourselves and the world feeds our insecurity and therefore our preoccupation with power, which we seek in order to secure ourselves. The unfortunate fact that we never feel secure enough is experienced as a lack of sufficient power" (p. 29). Overall, Loy's presentation of the cause of suffering (dukkha) in terms of lack, fear, reality projects, and dualism augments well the traditional Buddhist focus on clinging and ignorance of impermanence.Loy develops his analysis by expounding on the three types of suffering outlined in the Pali canon and their connection to social dukkha. He amplifies the construct of the "three poisons" (greed, ill will, and delusion) by highlighting their "institutionalization" and the ways in which capitalism promotes and spreads these mental states (pp. 80–86). And, proceeding along this trajectory, he expands the scope of the traditional antidotes to the three poisons: "Collectively as well as individually, institutionally as well as personally, greed must be transformed into generosity, ill will into loving-kindness, ignorance into wisdom" (p. 29). Loy also deploys Buddhist critiques of dualistic conceptualization to point out that the problem of poverty concerns not only the lack of material things needed for physical well-being but several other dimensions: "the craving for wealth as haunted by fear of poverty, global poverty as necessary to monetarize and commodify the 'undeveloped' world, and poverty as a necessary benchmark for the wealthy to appreciate their own achievements" (p. 196).Other parts of the book deserving close attention are Loy's social interpretation of the five precepts (p. 38), his sketch of the common ground between Christianity and Buddhism (pp. 117–119), and his presentation of karma, about which he writes, "we construct ourselves by what we choose to do. My sense of self is a precipitate of my habitual ways of thinking, feeling, and acting. Just as my body is composed of the food I eat, so my character is built by my conscious decisions" (p. 7). And contrary to those who construe contemporary Engaged Buddhism as the first form of Buddhism to engage itself significantly with sociopolitical problems, Loy astutely... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Just Peace:A Buddhist-Christian Path to LiberationKyeongil JungThe primary goal of religion is liberation from suffering, and the state of liberation is peace. In that sense religion is a salvific and peace-seeking path. But just as many rivers flow into one great ocean, there are many paths to liberation, that is, to peace. Since the destination is the same, peace-seekers may walk on one path, two paths, or more. I (...) don't know whether it is due to good karma or divine grace, but I have been walking on two paths, Buddhist and Christian, since I began to pursue a spiritual-social transformation of the self and the world. This is possible, as my late friend Praveen Chaudhari said, not because the two paths are the same but precisely because they are different.The contrasting difference I have experienced is that while Buddhism is a path of peace to peace, Christianity is a path of justice to peace. This difference has become more apparent to me as I have studied and practiced both socially engaged Buddhism and liberation theology. Engaged Buddhists seek to achieve peace through "being peace," which is an impartial and nonadversarial way of proceeding, whereas liberative Christians seek to achieve peace through working for justice, which entails a preferential and confrontational attitude. But in these differences I believe that the two approaches can complement, not contradict, each other. They can do so because Buddhism and Christianity are differently but equally salvific paths on the common ground of human suffering.I walk on the two paths to peace at the same time. While this may not be possible intellectually and logically, in my experience it becomes possible through praxis. Liberation theologians are right that theological reflection is a "second act" that follows the first act: the praxis of liberation. In this essay I reflect on four major oppositions that have arisen in the course of my dual praxis: compassion language and justice language, peace and justice, nonviolence and violence, and meditation and action. In each case the opposition is resolved through mutual correction in view of the salvific purpose of both emphases.Compassion Language and Justice LanguageThere are two languages that inspire people to respond to human suffering, namely, the language of compassion and that of justice. Though the two languages are spoken [End Page 3] by Buddhists as well as Christians, compassion language is often attributed to Buddhism and justice language to Christianity. Buddhists draw mainly on compassion language to respond to human suffering. Such language is impartial: it does not discriminate between victims and victimizers, but encourages Buddhists to be compassionate toward both. Thich Nhat Hanh gives a striking illustration of the impartiality of Buddhist compassion: "I am the twelve-year-old girl, refugee on a small boat, who throws herself into the ocean after being raped by a sea pirate. And I am the pirate, my heart not yet capable of seeing and loving."1The two italicized "be" verbs challenge me. Though it is not always easy, I have no problem with the first "am" in the poem. I am compassionate toward the poor twelve-year-old girl. I feel her pain, shame, and despair. The compassion language does not allow me to distance myself here from her there. The girl's suffering is my suffering; I am the twelve-year-old girl. But, the second "am" takes my breath away. It is unthinkable and even immoral to identify myself with the sea pirate and to be compassionate toward him. I am not the pirate. Instead of compassion, I feel anger. The pirate should be punished for his heinous crime. I must take sides with the girl against the sea pirate. Why on earth is Nhat Hanh compassionate toward the evil sea pirate?Nhat Hanh was also angry when he heard of the girl's cruel fate. However, after meditating on the tragedy, he realized that he could not simply take sides: "If I had been born in his village and brought up under the same conditions, I would be exactly like him."2 He cannot take sides because he is aware of conditions in which a poor... (shrink)

We are often confronted with attempts to debunk our aesthetic tastes, like: “You only like jazz because you’re a pretentious hipster,” or, “Your love of the Western canon is just colonialism speaking.” Such debunking arguments often try to give a socio-historical accounting, intended to de-legitimize our tastes by showing that they arise from processes uninterested in real aesthetic value. One common version is the Art Populist debunk: that claims of aesthetic expertise in esoteric arts are really just elitist gatekeeping. Then (...) we have its mirror twin, the Art Expert debunk: that the populist love of simple arts serves the interests of profiteering entertainment corporations dispensing simplified slop. Suppose we accept one of these debunking argument. How are we supposed to got on? Are we supposed to not like the things we like, or force ourselves to choke down food we don’t enjoy? And suppose we accept both of these debunking arguments — what then? Are we supposed to simply give up our grip on beauty altogether? This is hard to imagine. Aesthetic debunking arguments have a harder time getting a grip on us, because aesthetic life involves a distinctively tight relationship between our felt aesthetic phenomena and our aesthetic judgments. Aesthetic life gives us phenomenal resistance to debunking arguments, when our felt loves lag behind our endorsed beliefs. I suggest a way through that offers a livable accommodation. We may be able to treat such debunking arguments, not as targeting the positive content of our taste, but as targeting the boundaries and limitations on our taste. That is, a Populist may not be able to debunk my deep felt love of opera, but they may be able to debunk my dismissal of dance-pop. In this case, we can take onboard both the Art Expert’s and the Art Populist’s debunking arguments, as targeting different varieties of narrowness and dismissal. These debunkings, then, move us, not towards aesthetic nihilism, but aesthetic expansionism. (shrink)

Should the existence of moral disagreement reduce one’s confidence in one’s moral judgments? Many have claimed that it should not. They claim that we should be morally self-sufficient: that one’s moral judgment and moral confidence ought to be determined entirely one’s own reasoning. Others’ moral beliefs ought not impact one’s own in any way. I claim that moral self-sufficiency is wrong. Moral self-sufficiency ignores the degree to which moral judgment is a fallible cognitive process like all the rest. In this (...) paper, I take up two possible routes to moral self-sufficiency.First, I consider Robert Paul Wolff’s argument that an autonomous being is required to act from his own reasoning. Does Wolff’s argument yield moral self-sufficiency? Wolff’s argument does forbid unthinking obedience. But it does not forbid guidance: the use of moral testimony to glean evidence about nonmoral states of affairs. An agent can use the existence of agreement or disagreement as evidence concerning the reliability of their own cognitive abilities, which is entirely nonmoral information. Corroboration and discorroboration yields nonmoral evidence, and no reasonable theory of autonomy can forbid the use of nonmoral evidence. In fact, by using others to check on my own cognitive functionality, an agent is reasoning better and is thereby more autonomous.Second, I consider Philip Nickel’s requirement that moral judgment proceed from personal understanding. I argue that the requirement of understanding does forbid unthinking obedience, but not discorroboration. When an agent reasons morally, and then reduces confidence in their judgments through discorroboration, they are in full contact with the moral reasons, and with the epistemic reasons. Discorroboration yields more understanding, not less. (shrink)

This is my reply to commentators in the symposium on my book, GAMES: AGENCY AS ART. The symposium features commentary by Thomas Hurka, Quill Kukla, and Alva Noe, and originally appeared in Analysis 81 (2).

Is there a right or wrong way to play a game? Many think not. Some have argued that, when we insist that players obey the rules of a game, we give too much weight to the author’s intent. Others have argued that such obedience to the rules violates the true purpose of games, which is fostering free and creative play. Both of these responses, I argue, misunderstand the nature of games and their rules. The rules do not tell us how (...) to interpret a game; they merely tell us what the game is. And the point of the rules is not always to foster free and creative play. The point can be, instead, to communicate a sculpted form of activity. And in games, as with any form of communication, we need some shared norms to ground communicative stability. Games have what has been called a “prescriptive ontology.” A game is something more than simply a piece of material. It is some material as approached in a certain specified way. These prescriptions help to fix a common object of attention. Games share this prescriptive ontology with more traditional kinds of works. Novels are more than just a set of words on a page; they are those words read in a certain order. Games are more than just some software or cardboard bits; they are those bits interacted with according to certain rules. Part of a game’s essential nature is the prescriptions for how we are to play it. What’s more, we investigate the prescriptive ontology of games, we will uncover at least distinct prescriptive categories of games. Party games prescribe that we encounter the game once; heavy strategy games prescribe we encounter the game many times; and community evolution games prescribe that we encounter the game while embedded in an ongoing community of play. (shrink)

Luck egalitarians think that considerations of responsibility can excuse departures from strict equality. However critics argue that allowing responsibility to play this role has objectionably harsh consequences. Luck egalitarians usually respond either by explaining why that harshness is not excessive, or by identifying allegedly legitimate exclusions from the default responsibility-tracking rule to tone down that harshness. And in response, critics respectively deny that this harshness is not excessive, or they argue that those exclusions would be ineffective or lacking in justification. (...) Rather than taking sides, after criticizing both positions I also argue that this way of carrying on the debate – i.e. as a debate about whether the harsh demands of responsibility outweigh other considerations, and about whether exclusions to responsibility-tracking would be effective and/or justified – is deeply problematic. On my account, the demands of responsibility do not – in fact, they can not – conflict with the demands of other normative considerations, because responsibility only provides a formal structure within which those other considerations determine how people may be treated, but it does not generate its own practical demands. (shrink)

This paper critically examines the extent to which health promoting wearable technologies can provide people with greater autonomy over their health. These devices are frequently presented as a means of expanding the possibilities people have for making healthier decisions and living healthier lives. We accept that by collecting, monitoring, analysing and displaying biomedical data, and by helping to underpin motivation, wearable technologies can support autonomy over health. However, we argue that their contribution in this regard is limited and that—even with (...) respect to their ‘autonomy enhancing’ potential—these devices may deliver costs as well as benefits. We proceed by rehearsing the distinction that can be drawn between procedural autonomy and substantive-relational autonomy. While the information provided by wearable technologies may support deliberation and decision-making, in isolation these technologies do little to provide substantive opportunities to act and achieve better health. As a consequence, wearable technologies risk generating burdens of anxiety and stigma for their users and reproducing existing health inequalities. We then reexamine the extent to which wearable technologies actually support autonomous deliberation. We argue that wearable technologies that subject their users to biomedical and consumerist epistemologies, norms and values also risk undermining processes of genuinely autonomous deliberation. (shrink)

Moral reasoning is as fallible as reasoning in any other cognitive domain, but we often behave as if it were not. I argue for a form of epistemically-based moral humility, in which we downgrade our moral beliefs in the face of moral disagreement. My argument combines work in metaethics and moral intuitionism with recent developments in epistemology. I argue against any demands for deep self-sufficiency in moral reasoning. Instead, I argue that we need to take into account significant socially sourced (...) information, especially as a check for failures on our own moral intuitions and reasoning. -/- First, I argue for an epistemically plausible version of moral intuitionism, based on recent work in epistemic entitlement and epistemic warrant. Second, I argue that getting clear on the epistemic basis shows the defeasibility of moral judgment. Third, I argue the existence of moral disagreement is a reason to reduce our certainty in moral judgment. Fourth, I argue that this effect is not a violation of norms of autonomy for moral judgment. (shrink)

The paper attempts to construct a global model of a social contract using well-known metaphors of two great philosophers: Jean-Jacques Rousseau and John Locke. By modelling a global social contract, I mean the formulation of a social contract using two sets of data: one is global citizens' preferences about values and norms while the other is sovereign states' participation in multilateral treaties. Both Rousseau and Locke formulate their versions of social contract theories in the national context of eighteenth-century Europe. This (...) paper tries my hands on extending their theories to the global context. This paper attempts to link empirically the relationship between global citizens' preferences as gauged by the World Values Survey and sovereign states' participation in 120 multilateral treaties deposited to the United Nations. To see the link between citizens and treaties (quasi-legislative outcomes, sort of), dimensional similarities of the cosmos of citizens' preference and the cosmos of sovereign states' willingness to join multilateral treaties are examined. Once done, all the sovereign states are located in each of the two cosmoses, citizens and states, and the correlation coefficients between them are measured. Based on these empirical results, the nature of the global quasi-legislative process is clarified. Conclusions and implications are drawn. (shrink)

Why are cities looking more and more alike? Why do hipster coffee shops and clothing boutiques all share that same vibe? One answer is that gentrification represents an invasive force that forcibly re-models cities, from the top-down, to meet the monotone eye of the gentrifier. Gentrification brings in external developers and designers, who create new businesses which all meet that one monotonous aesthetic mold. But I suggest, using work from Quill Kukla and Jane Jacobs, that this top-down model of gentrification (...) is incomplete. Gentrification also incentivizes local residents to remake their own businesses and properties to meet that monotone eye. Gentrification is a pressure which pushes cities to meet a universalized and therefore homogenized taste, rather than letting diverse tastes flourish. (This piece originally published as part of a symposium on Quill Kukla's City Living.). (shrink)

O confucionismo existe, na vida espiritual do povo vietnamita, desde muito tempo. A parte positiva do Confucionismo pode-se dizer que é o fato de ele contribuir para o fortalecimento das relações familiares, entre os parentes, bem como nas relações sociais de um modo geral; outra parte positiva consiste em motivar as pessoas a desenvolverem o gosto pela leitura e aprendizagem. Estima-se que a ética confucionista precisa ser provocada, a fim de contribuir para a construção da sociedade nos dias atuais. Na (...) contramão dessa positividade, pode-se afirmar que o confucionismo, de maneira geral, não valoriza, na medida necessária, o papel das mulheres na sociedade; na realidade, ele as classifica como pessoas insignificantes. É digno de se observar, entretanto, que, no contexto social específico do Vietnã, as mulheres encontram um lugar próprio na sociedade. Nossa pesquisa visa mostrar exatamente essa diferente concepção do papel da mulher na socidade vietnamita. (shrink)

Do I ever directly raise my arm? Before dealing with this question we must make clear that the corresponding affirmation is to be taken as a way of rejecting one interpretation of the question, ‘In doing or by doing what do I raise my arm?’ On the interpretation of the question I have in mind the appropriate reply, if the question were not rejected, would be, ‘I raise my arm in or by doing something internal’. The way we are employing (...) the phrase ‘doing something internal’ will, I think, become clear when we consider candidates for the description ‘doing something internal’. But it is important to remember that to affirm that I directly raise my arm is to reject the question, ‘In doing or by doing what do I raise my arm?’ on our interpretation of the question. (shrink)

Market crises amplify fear, disrupting rational decision-making of stock investment. This study examines the relationship between investors’ information priorities—such as intuition, company performance, technical analysis, and other factors—and their fear responses (freeze, flight, and hiding) during market crashes. Using the Bayesian Mindsponge Framework (BMF) to analyze data from 1,526 investors in China and Vietnam, the findings reveal complex dynamics. We found positive associations between investors’ prioritization of social influence and intuition for investment decision-making with being freeze (i.e., not knowing what (...) to do with the owned stock), between prioritization of professionals’ evaluation and intuition with fleeing (i.e. giving up stock investment permanently), and between prioritization of professionals’ evaluation and social influence with hiding (i.e., stopping investing in stock for a while). In contrast, prioritization of companies’ performance metrics (e.g., net profit, debt, etc.) was negatively associated with being freeze, fleeing, and hiding. Meanwhile, prioritization of professionals’ evaluation, technical analysis, and liquidity was negatively associated with being freeze, fleeing, and hiding, respectively. The study highlights the importance of disseminating transparent, accurate information through government and media channels, along with implementing financial education programs, to promote rational investment decisions and reduce fear-driven behaviors. (shrink)

The concept of “the body without organs” takes up a great part of the oeuvre of Deleuze and Guattari. Yet, it is difficult to answer their question–“How do you make yourself a body without organs?”–or to understand their answer. In this paper I propose that the body without organs is an ethical concept. To support this assertion, I relate, especially, Deleuze’s thought on the Norwegian author Karl Ove Knausgård’s auto-fictive project, My Struggle, suggesting that My Struggle can be read as (...) a body without organs. By doing so, I aim at two things: first, to illustrate a possible application of Deleuze’s ethic, and second, to show how such an ethic may guide us regarding what we ought to do. (shrink)

Coastal protection is crucial to human development since the ocean has many values associated with the economy, ecosystem, and culture. However, most ocean protecting efforts are currently ineffective due to the burdens of finance, lack of appropriate management, and international cooperation regimes. For aiding bottom-up initiatives for ocean protection support, this study employed the Mindsponge Theory to examine how the public’s perceived economic and cultural values influence their willingness to support actions to protect the ocean. Analyzing the European-Union-Horizon-2020-funded dataset of (...) 709 respondents from 42 countries, we discovered that perceived economic values have negative effects on the tendency of ocean protection supports (i.e., food, transportation, renewable energy, oil and gas, and recreation). In contrast, certain perceived cultural values can help increase the willingness to do so (i.e., mental well-being and sense of identity). However, the effects of perceived cultural values are only moderately reliable. These findings suggest that designing cultural information delivery campaigns can help promote coastal reserve supports, such as fundraisings and preserving the oceans from the community. (shrink)

Este artigo analisa a visão filosófica marxista da natureza humana e como aplicar essa perspectiva no desenvolvimento de recursos humanos de alta qualidade no Vietnã hoje, tendo por base a metodologia materialista dialética e o materialismo histórico, com foco na natureza humana e no conceito de natureza humana como o total das relações sociais; analisa também, com base nos mesmos conceitos, os desafios e oportunidades para o desenvolvimento de recursos humanos no contexto da industrialização, modernização e integração internacionais, além de (...) investigar soluções sugeridas para construir uma estratégia abrangente e sustentável de recursos humanos. Como conlusão, os resultados da pesquisa mostram que é necessário associar desenvolvimento humano ao processo de desenvolvimento socioeconômico, defendendo o papel dos trabalhadores, enquanto sujeitos históricos, e fortalecer a educação e o treinamento em concomitantemente aos mecanismos razoáveis ​​de gestão e bem-estar, encorajando a criatividade e a iniciativa de recursos humanos. Desse modo, assim, o Vietnã pode melhorar a qualidade do trabalho, atender aos requisitos de integração e aumentar a competitividade nacional. (shrink)

Deep brain stimulation is a well-accepted treatment for movement disorders and is currently explored as a treatment option for various neurological and psychiatric disorders. Several case studies suggest that DBS may, in some patients, influence mental states critical to personality to such an extent that it affects an individual’s personal identity, i.e. the experience of psychological continuity, of persisting through time as the same person. Without questioning the usefulness of DBS as a treatment option for various serious and treatment refractory (...) conditions, the potential of disruptions of psychological continuity raises a number of ethical and legal questions. An important question is that of legal responsibility if DBS induced changes in a patient’s personality result in damage caused by undesirable or even deviant behavior. Disruptions in psychological continuity can in some cases also have an effect on an individual’s mental competence. This capacity is necessary in order to obtain informed consent to start, continue or stop treatment, and it is therefore not only important from an ethical point of view but also has legal consequences. Taking the existing literature and the Dutch legal system as a starting point, the present paper discusses the implications of DBS induced disruptions in psychological continuity for a patient’s responsibility for action and competence of decision and raises a number of questions that need further research. (shrink)

This paper aims to show that Wittgenstein’s approach to the concepts of sensation and emotion can shed light on many philosophical dilemmas that remain present in the contemporary debate. My analysis will start by characterizing Jesse Prinz’s approach to emotions (heavily influenced by the physiological theory of William James) and, then, it will proceed to show that Prinz is subject to the same criticisms that Wittgenstein expressed about William James’s theory. Finally, I will argue that Wittgenstein, in Philosophical Investigations, advocated (...) for a peculiar kind of expressivism that, while having profound differences from traditional expressivism, is able to appear as a non-cognitivist position. I will argue further that William James’s error (and hence also Prinz’s) is disregarding the multiple uses of psychological terms (that is, to think that psychological terms have a uniform use). (shrink)

: Nguyen Trai is a man with a great personality in Vietnam. He has morality, culture, pure soul, and profound wisdom of all times. Nguyen Trai lived in the 15th century in a feudal society with many changes. The paper studied Nguyen Trai’s philosophical thoughts to help develop a prosperous and happy country using the nation’s traditional cultural values. The article uses the methodology of dialectical materialism as a general principle and a specific historical principle to evaluate Nguyen Trai’s benevolence (...) and righteousness in terms of compassion, justice, and management, associated with the interests of the people, the community, and society. The article also uses analytical and synthesis methods to highlight the content of benevolence and righteousness in the cultural tradition of the Vietnamese nation today. The Covid-19 pandemic had affected the world in general and Vietnam in particular. So Nguyen Trai’s thought culture is powerfully and effectively prompt in responding to the Covid-19 pandemic in Vietnam and other countries today. In this article, Nguyen Trai’s benevolence and righteousness fairness clearly define the responsibility of the state and the obligation of citizens to promote the traditional cultural values of the nation. Resumo: Nguyen Trai foi um grande filósofo patriótico vietnamita, uma das maiores personalidades de todos os tempos. Ele viveu no século XV; seus pensamentos se tornaram um grande exemplo de ética, cultura, alma e sabedoria vietnamitas. O artigo estudou os pensamentos filosóficos de Nguyen Trai, para ajudar a desenvolver um país próspero e feliz, usando os valores culturais tradicionais da nação. O texto utiliza a metodologia do materialismo dialético como princípio geral e como princípio histórico específico, a fim de avaliar a benevolência e a retidão de Nguyen Trai, em termos de compaixão, justiça e gestão, associadas aos interesses do povo, da comunidade e da sociedade. O artigo também usa métodos analíticos e de síntese, para destacar o conteúdo de benevolência e retidão, na tradição cultural da nação vietnamita hoje. A pandemia de Covid-19 afetou o mundo, em geral, e o Vietnã, em particular. Portanto, a cultura de pensamento de Nguyen Trai é poderosa e eficaz na resposta à pandemia de Covid19, no Vietnã e em outros países, na atualidade. Neste estudo, a benevolência e a justiça de Nguyen Trai definem claramente a responsabilidade do Estado e a obrigação dos cidadãos de promover os valores culturais tradicionais da nação. (shrink)